


The Thaddeus Junior That Wasn't (it's Warlock, Actually)

by Sar_Kalu



Series: Good Omens Tumblr Prompts [7]
Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: M/M, Nanny Crowley, brother francis, quick fic, raising the wrong child for the goo- the bad- the something of the world, warlock had the weirdest life poor lad
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-10
Updated: 2019-07-10
Packaged: 2020-06-26 02:54:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,680
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19759123
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sar_Kalu/pseuds/Sar_Kalu
Summary: When Warlock Dowling was born, he was supposed to be named Thaddeus Jr; but for the intervention of Satanic Nuns who thought him to be Satan Jr, he might well have been. This was not the least of the weirdness of his growing up.





	The Thaddeus Junior That Wasn't (it's Warlock, Actually)

Missus Harriet Dowling remembers that night well. Thaddeus had flown out the night before, just a bit before midnight, the first chartered flight he could get back stateside, mumbling about the President and his responsibilities and it would only be for a bit, darling, he’d be back in time for the birth, you’ll see…

Except he hadn’t been. Thaddeus hadn’t been back in time and John and Scott had been there but she didn’t want them, she wanted Thaddeus and her Mama had told her about the miracle of childbirth, how safe and easy it was these days but there was a burning deep in the cradle of her hips, a seizing that came from muscles contracting rhythmically and she knows this feeling well, gets it monthly, but not like this, it’s never been like this. This seems heavier somehow, darker, more richer in a way that she can’t place her fingers on.

Wave after wave of pain and cramping overtook her body until Harriet swore that this body was no longer hers, it felt unnatural and heavy, her body round and bloated and she swore, she swore when she wasn’t eyes clenched shut, screaming from the pain of it all, that her belly rippled beneath her shirt, her chest heaved and she gripped Scott’s hand tight, able to feel the way his bones ground together beneath his skin. Visceral the pain grew and grew until…

“Harriet, sweetie, Harriet,” Thaddeus’ voice broke through, a grounding call through the miasmic haze of pain, and she can’t help but yowl his name when he hangs up on her again, the fucking President demanding his attention again like some kind of national disaster being more important than this moment right here, right now; they were having a child, goddamnit, 

“THADDEUS!”

The actual birth, once she’d been deliciously numbed from the waist down by the Nun’s drugs, took very little time at all. In the end, her son was handed to her, slimy and gross and purple with blonde hair smeared across his head, and Harriet is all too glad to hand him back to the Nuns to get cleaned up. When he returns, Thaddeus is no longer on the phone, Scott and John are sharing sips of bourbon in the corner and the Head Nun (or whatever he title is) is standing at her side, her bouncy baby boy in her arms. He feels lighter this time around, but Harriet doesn’t let it bother her. 

The name, when they get to it, was always meant to be Thaddeus, but well, after twenty excruciating hours of labour, Harriet never wants to say her husbands name ever again and well, even if Warlock is an absolutely ridiculous name, in part because its British and she hates this godforsaken country, nothing would make Thaddeus more furious than to have the long Thaddeus Dowling ling broken. Her son deserved to be better than a fourth; Warlock Dowling the first, a proper name for her baby boy.

It takes several years but Harriet, who pours her whole life and self into her son when she’s not busy with other things, realises that she’s… not number one on his list anymore. The Nanny Thaddeus had hired, a strange British woman who looked nothing like Mary Poppins and who wore sunglasses all hours and long dark dresses and spoke with a crisp accent with just a hint of a burr, as though the woman had taught herself to speak correctly despite having lower class roots, had taken Harriets place. Then there was that Gardener, Brother something-or-other, with his ridiculous teeth and wild white hair and the kindest blue eyes, Warlock loved him too; nattered on and on about brother slug and sister snail and love for all creatures great and small, and Harriet often needed a stiff drink at the end of the day to handle it all.

Warlock grew, as all children do, rather akin to a weed. One moment he was teething and learning how to walk, holding Mommy’s hand, the next he was screaming for Nanny when he’d skinned his knee sliding down the bannisters and fallen onto the hardwood polished floors; and he’d been quick to learn that while Mommy loved him lots and lots, she was far far too busy to spend time with him. Luckily, Warlock has Nanny and Brother Francis, who help him with his lessons that he doesn’t understand and John and Scott, who are easily swayed into playing games of football with him (American football, not British football, Mommy doesn’t apree-shee-eight soccer). 

Warlock spends his childhood running around the grounds of his huge manor house and shirking all chores he’s handed by his mother and giving them to the staff. Despite this, and the many playdates that are arranged for him once he starts school, Warlock finds himself at loose ends more often than not. It’s a lonely existence, being an only child. Privileged, certainly, he will realise when he’s older, but lonely all the same. Apart from Nanny and Brother Frances, very few people have time for Warlock before he’s eleven. 

Nanny is his favourite, though it’d break Brother Frances’ heart to hear it he knows so he never says anything, but Nanny with her soft hands and dark glasses not only lets Warlock get away with everything a little boy dreams of and enforces rules very rarely, but also knows when he needs her. Nanny who smells a little bit like an open fire place, with her velvet gowns that are both soft and rough to the touch, Nanny with arms that wrap him in tight hugs when he feels like all the world is breaking around him because even little boys need moments to fall apart in loss of all the things they never had. It is those moments that stop Nanny from truly corrupting him, because kindness and compassion are never evil, and Warlock always preferred mischief to harm like Nanny - and in that, he knows Brother Frances would be very proud.

Years later, Warlock would name his first born son Frances, after the gentle gardner who taught him to love each and every creature great and small, (although his daughter, Antonia, would always hold the softest place in his heart). Brother Frances of the wild white hair and large front teeth, always, always smelt of old books, ink, and wool, though for the life of him, Warlock could not remember any time when he’d seen the ageing gardener with anything but a rake in his hand. Brother Frances had more often than not taken young Warlock by the hand and guided him from plant to plant, teaching him their names and what they liked best; sometimes, Nanny would follow behind, umbrella overhead and a faint, patient smile on her face. 

Warlock remembers those parts of his childhood with fondness, whispering those stories into the hair of his children heads. Stories that his mother, Harriet would listen to when she sat in the rocking chair, a confused frown on her brow because none of Warlock’s memories seemed to match up with her own and his father was as absent then as he still was to that day. Warlock’s not even sure that his father had met him personally until he was four.

That was the biggest, gaping abyss that Scott and John would step into, trying to fill it up to the seams: the absence of his father. 

Thaddeus J. Dowling was a hard man, disciplined but joyous. Warlock remembers his hands most of all, broad and strong and capable of tossing him into the air with ease; not that he was tossed around much at all. Thaddeus, despite his profuse assurances that he’d be there for Warlock as he grew up, missed more than his fair share of his childs life. 

At first, it wasn’t that big of a deal. Who needs to see their childs first steps when you see them chase a ball across the field and score the first goal of the game? Who needs to see their child teeth and speak, when you’re there to catch them win the debating championship in middle school? Who needs to know what their child gets up to as a boy, when you’re there to catch their antics as an eighteen year old and drinking for the first time? 

Thaddeus went from staring at a new born face on an iPad screen to staring into the foreign gaze of a young adult man, serious and steady, telling him that he was going into Environmental Law, as though all Dowling men hadn’t been Republicans and senior advisors to the President before him. Thaddeus did not know his son, not really and wasn’t sure how to bridge the gap that seemed to span between them, an indefinable chasm wrought by years and absence, with other men filling the space where he left.

Harriet has screamed for his presence from day one; but Thaddeus has never answered, too busy for such things, until now, and as he son walked out of the delivery room, daughter in his arms, Thaddeus wonders if this was the moment he’d missed? If this, his son and his wife, heads bent of the small red face of a newborn child, was everything Thaddeus should have been there for…

Had any of the Dowling clan looked up, they might have seen two figures, one with white wings and the other with black, both smiling softly in remembrance as Antonia Johanna Dowling was introduced the to world; and some three years later, they were there again, still smiling brightly, as Francis Scott Dowling was introduced by his older sister, and just before the two Beings left

Warlock Dowling raised his head, met their eyes, and smiled as bright as the sun rise. The years had been kind to them, if not to him, but Warlock had been a child and he’d believed in some miraculous things in his time, and even he knew that Nanny Crowley and Brother Frances had been more than they had seemed.

**Author's Note:**

> In response to crowleyandaziraphaleruinedme's post: I don’t think we’re giving Harriet Dowling enough credit….like she is so fucking PETTY that when her husband didn’t show up while she was in labour, she literally names their kid WARLOCK. It’s pretty evident that the name Thaddeus had already been agreed upon, but boy oh boy, you don’t want to let Harriet make decisions while she’s angry  
> .  
> .  
> .  
> Come hunt me down on [tumblr](https://sar-kalu.tumblr.com/)


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